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November 12, 2014

Agency Visits

I enjoyed the traumatic experience of calling adoption agencies on my lunch break last Friday. All I wanted to do was schedule a sit-down with someone at 3 different agencies to go over some questions I need answered before we can choose an agency to work with. Nope, sorry, doesn't work like that. At City A's agency we *have* to attend a structured orientation session with a bunch of other couples in the evening. At City B's agency, they do everything over the phone because "isn't that so much more convenient than taking a half or whole day off to come down for an appointment?". City C's agency, fortunately, was all “of course we can do that! Would you like to leave a voicemail and she’ll call you back or you can schedule it all through email.” Really? I can have my private, face-to-face appointment? You aren't going to force me into a situation I don’t want to be in and certainly isn't the best way for us to ask/process information? That is so novel…

I have already had to grieve the loss of control over almost every facet of family building, just let me ask my damn questions the way I want to! In person, in private! This is *such* a big decision, possibly the biggest of our lives. I want to meet these people in person, get a feel for their personality etc., if we are going to be working with them and trusting them to help us over the next 2 years - I need to know if I can feel at ease with them. I want to meet them in private because this is so personal. My IF doctor didn't have me come to a group class to learn about IVF and I feel this should be treated the same way. I have very particular questions I want answered. I have already educated myself *A LOT* about adoption and these 3 agencies, I just need to check off a few very specific questions and I can make my decision. I don't want to sit through "Adoption for Dummies" for an hour on a week night after driving 45 minutes home from work and then 30 more minutes to the agency (in rush hour traffic no less :-P) . Plus, even though I know I am in a pretty good place of having dealt with my IF grief, I also know there are some things that can still bring me to tears - particularly in a high stress environment (another reason I wanted control over when the appointment was, so I could be as much at ease as possible). I prefer my privacy to deal with my emotions rather than being in a big group setting.

The group info session in City A is tonight. I'm not really looking forward to it simply because of the logistics to get there on time making me anxious. I would have much preferred scheduling something during the day and taking time off from work to eliminate outside stressors. I would love to be proven wrong about how unhelpful this will be. I would love to be blown away and so happy with their presentation - Mmmm, crow!

We have decided to interview 1 agency a week, so next week we will visit the agency in City C - the one that didn't act like I was crazy for wanting to sit down one on one with someone. Right now, they are my favorite agency based on their website and info packet. Unfortunately, they are also the farthest away. The other 2 agencies are between 30 and 45 minutes from our house. City C is at least an hour if not more :-/ But you know what, if they make us feel the most comfortable and their methods match our concerns, then I will happily burn those miles.